ESPN Classic

Day Three blog
Day One Bass Blog

ANDERSON, S.C., 3:45 p.m. — 2/23/2008

All the boats have checked in, or at least should have. And we've seen no significant changes. Only time and a weigh-in will tell how things will shake out.

Our standings until the fish hit scales look like this:

• Alton Jones 35-5
• Kevin VanDam 31-11
• Charlie Hartley 31-10
• Cliff Pace 30-8
• Michael Iaconelli 30-5
• Bobby Lane 30-1
• Jeff Kriet 29-7
• Scott Rook 28-4
• Mike Baskett 27-9
• Aaron Martens 27-7

A couple of things to remember. Obviously these are guesses from an observer. But we've been close for the most part.

Pay attention to Ike. Maybe he wasn't as big eyed today or maybe he was more so.

This time yesterday, we had Hartley in third, a similar place he's in now. He may be sandbagging again.

A few minutes ago, Edwin Evers observer recorded a catch. But he keyed it in at 22 pounds. That's impossible. But he may have culled and moved up. Without that catch, he's in 11th place with 26-6.

The live weigh-in will start soon on Bassmaster.com.

ANDERSON, S.C., 3:30 p.m. — 2/23/2008

If this were Day One the standings would certainly be different for this event.

Alton Jones won the day with 18 pounds and he would be followed by these anglers.

• Jeff Kriet 16-8
• Boyd Duckett 15-8
• Bobby Lane 15-1
• Richard Watson 14-10
• Aaron Martens 14-8
• Skeet Reese 13-4
• Tommy Biffle 13-4
• Peter Thliveros 12-11
• John Crews 12-8

Of course, those guys are scattered through out the standings, but it does give you a good look at how important consistency is in these events. One good day just won't cut it.

ANDERSON, S.C., 3:20 p.m. — 2/23/2008

The last-minute heroics aren't blowing up the system yet. But KVD caught a keeper a few minutes ago that helped his weight by 6 ounces.

Not much, but good enough to put him in second place in our unofficial standings.

Right now, Alton still leads with 35-5. He caught his last keeper, a 4-pounder at 11:18 a.m.

Then you have VanDam, who boated his 1-10 at 3:10 p.m.

Charlie Hartley is third with 31-10 and his last keeper came at 1:49 p.m., but it was too small to cull with.

Cliff Pace is fourth with 30-8, and his last 2-pounder came at 2:28 p.m. That was big enough to gain 8 ounces.

And Micahael Iaconelli caught his last keeper at 1:18 p.m.. It was 3-8 and gave him a 30-5 total and fifth place position, at least for now.

Still watching.

ANDERSON, S.C., 3:05 p.m. — 2/23/2008

More on the Baskett.

I don't know how it slipped by me. But I was looking more into what Mike Baskett was doing. And he hasn't caught a limit yet.

That 12-pound stringer of his is only three fish, two of those in the 5-pound range.

Another two like that in these last few minutes and he could be leading this thing. Obviously, that's a lot to ask for, but one can hope.

ANDERSON, S.C., 3 p.m. — 2/23/2008

It's getting close now and for most of the last two days I keep wondering when we were going to see a showing out of our Federation Nation hands.

Almost every Classic I've covered, and this has been my 20th, one of the Federation Nation members has held up the banner for all us club and weekend anglers.

It looks like this year may not be any different. Mike Baskett, a police officer from Salem, Ore., has apprehended a nice limit and shot into the top 10, at least for the moment.

He has 12-6 for the day and a total 27-9. I'm rooting for Baskett. Can't help it.

For the rest of the 10, there's not much change.

I'm starting to worry a bit about Casey Ashley. He said this morning, "if you're not in the top five after today, it's over."

That may be a little much. But he's not any where close. Right now, he still only has two keepers and has dropped to 19th place with 23-2.

That's going to hurt a lot of fantasy scores (which will be updated soon, computer glitches still has that one down).

Another worry is Kelly Jordon. He and Matthew Spahr are the only anglers to show a blank today.

Jordon, though, went into the day with 14-7 and sitting in 16th place. I fear an electonic glitch on that one as well, for his sake any way.

We're getting close to wrapping up this day. The first flight checks in at 3:15 p.m., and the second at 3:45 p.m.

Yesterday there were some last-minute heroics that didn't get recorded. But for the most part we hit the estimates pretty close.

We still look at this like a political poll with a plus/minus margin of error of about 4 pounds.

Currently, the top 10 looks like this

• 1. Alton Jones 35-5
• 2. Charlie Hartley 31-10
• 3. Kevin VanDam 30-13
• 4. Cliff Pace 30-8
• 5. Michael Iaconelli 30-5
• 6. Bobby Lane 30-1
• 7. Jeff Kriet 29-7
• 8. Scott Rook 28-4
• 9. Mike Baskett 27-9
• 10. Aaron Martens 26-7

Stay tuned

ANDERSON, S.C., 2:20 p.m. — 2/23/2008

The heart breaks are filtering in. It was just a matter of time.

Years ago, Scott Rook and I were team partners in local bass events around home. We were both young then. But even then you could see the skills he had. That's why I've been perplexed the last few hours wondering why in the heck he hadn't broke off that 7-pound, 7-ounce mark.

After a call to the cameraman, it was painfully apparent. Not too long ago, Rook lost a 5-pound class fish at the boat. It's the kind of fish that would have added four pounds to his weight and moved him to second place.

He only knows half of that. But he also knows you can't win big-time tournaments by losing fish, any fish. That it's a comparable giant, that much the worse.

Lucky for him, no one is really separating themselves from the field right now.

Alton Jones remains at the top of the standings. And Charlie Hartley has upgraded his weight some to 10-9. But with the exception of Jeff Kriet making a move abd KVD finally catching them, Rook is not much worse for wear.

He'll just have to pull it together.

Skeet Reese keeps improving. He's now at 12-12 for the day and is in 13th place with 24-1. Casey Ashley has finally caiught another keeper, a 1/2-pounder and he's come from 26th to 18th.

There's a lot of fishing left. But like the last hour yesterday, there are a lot of guys begging for that one big fish. Someone will find it. Most of them won't.

I just wonder who is panicking right now.

ANDERSON, S.C., 2:16 p.m. — 2/23/2008
It was only a matter of time. Every bass fishing fan in the world knew it was coming, we just didn't know when.

"When" was about 20 minutes ago when Kevin VanDam showed up for Day Two. During that time he's put together a limit totalling 10 pounds, 4 ounces to move him out of the doldrums and into third place, right where he started the day.

The biggest change in all of that is VanDam has spent most of the event on the lower end of Lake Hartwell. He's now up the Seneca River, not too far from his buddy and traveling partner Scott Rook.

He needs to help a brother out too. Rook is stuck at 7-7 and is now in eighth place. He's missing the quality bites of yesterday.

The top 10 shapes up like this:
1. Alton Jones 35-5
2. Charlie Hartley 31-10
3. Kevin VanDam 30-7
4. Michael Iaconelli 30-5
5. Cliff Pace 30-2
6. Bobby Lane 30-1
7. Jeff Kriet 29-7
8. Scott Rook 28-4
9. Aaron Martens 26-7
10. Edwin Evers 26-6

Notables below that are:

Terry Scroggins stuck in 14th with two fish at 4-7 and 23-10
Skeet Reese in 18th with 10-8 and 21-13 overall
Richard Watson, one of the Federation Nation members, has an impressive
sack at 13-14. He's in 19th with 21-7 overall.
. . .and Boyd Duckett is on the bubble at 25th with 15-8 today 20-7 overall.

ANDERSON, S.C., 1:25 p.m. — 2/23/2008

The surprises have started rolling in.

Jeff Kriet who has been out of sight and out of mind for most of the last two days is making a move.

He started the day in 23rd place, on the bubble for making the final 25-man cut.

Today he's backed that up with 15-8 and has moved into 6th place with 28-7.

We mentioned in the last installment that those shallower fish might pick up the pace a bit as the day wore on. Kriet is our proof in the pudding, he's fishing similarly to Charlie Hartley, just miles apart.

If that type of thing is a clue of things to come, look for Skeet Reese and Edwin Evers to turn up the heat as well.

Reese and Evers aren't flipping. Both are doing something totally different.

But it's the of type things that could produce the right kind of weight.

For the record, Reese is in 15th with 10-8 today and 21-13 overall.

Evers is in 11th with 4-15 on the day and 23-6 overall.

ANDERSON, S.C., 1:15 p.m. — 2/23/2008

Here is a rundown of our current leader, Alton Jones' day:

8:04 — Catches his first keeper weighing 2-8.
8:19 — The second one comes in the boat at 3-0, total 5-8.
8:26 — The third one hits the deck weighing 3-8; bring the total thus far to 9-0.

Then there's a two hour dry spell. I've been in those before. It will be interesting if Alton thought about adjusting or changing. Or if he stuck with what he was doing.

10:25 a.m. — The fourth fish is caught, a 3-8, giving him 12-8 for the day.
10:34 a.m. — The limit is full with 4-pounder and 16-8 total.

That has to be a good feeling, made only better by the last catch.

11:18 a.m. — He catches his sixth fish, another 4 pounder, throwing out the 2-8 and bringing his total to 18 pounds.

While Alton was doing that this is the way it looked for Charlie Hartley.

7:44 a.m. — First fish is caught weighing in at 1-9
7:52 a.m.— Second fish at 3-2 and 4-11 total
8:54 a.m. — Third fish 1-6 and 6-1 total.

At this point he took over the lead, previously taken from him by Bobby Lane.

9:26 a.m. — The fourth fish is caught a 1-4 and 7-5 total.
10:42 a.m. — The limit is full with a 2-8 and he stands at 9-13.

The thing about Hartley is he's flipping boat docks in some of the shallowest water on the lake. Of course most of the docks on Hartwell are dry as a bone. But he's going as far as he can in some of these docks and fishing extremely slow, painstakingly slow.

It worked yesterday, and with this sun and warming trend, you have to believe it will only get better.

ANDERSON, S.C., 12:50 p.m. — 2/23/2008

This is about as long as I've gone without an update.

Main reason: Not a lot is happening.

Alton Jones is still the man. He's up to 18 pounds for the day and sits atop the leaders with 35-5.

Hartley has a 10-pound limit in second, but more than 4 pounds behind at this point.

Bobby Lane had dropped out of the top five by this point yesterday, but he keeps hanging around. He's upped his total to 15 pounds and is in third with 30-1.

Michael Iaconelli is in fourth with a limit totalling 10 pounds, but that is only if you can trust the estimates. He thought he had 20 plus yesterday and wound up with 18. Hard to misjudge 10 pounds, but I've seen crazier things happen.

Scott Rook is in fifth place. He has a limit at 7-7 for a total two-day weight of 28-4.

The only other notables are:

Aaron Martens reports in with a 13-8 stringer, but he had the Ike-Light estimate yesterday too. He's in sixth place.

Terry Scroggins is finally on the board with two keepers (4-7) and is now sitting in eighth place.

VanDam and Ashley still on the one-fish snide, which is killing my fantasy team. But I'm getting some help from Skeet Reese. He's finally come alive with a 10-8 stringer and is sitting in 14th place.

Roumbanis, who made a major move earlier, hasn't added much and is starting to get passed by those who are catching and culling. He's now in 28th place and in danger of missing the cut.

Gerald Swindle has a limit at 9 pounds and is in 24th, also in danger of missing the cut.

And lastly, Boyd Duckett, who basically sucked yesterday, is coming on with a limit totalling 13 pounds. That total has put him in 26th place, but he's obviously fugured something out.

A lot of those lasts few reports is action that is just now starting to pick up. Maybe we'll start seeing that afternoon bite soon. It's definitely getting warmer in the mansion.

ANDERSON, S.C.. 11:45 a.m. — 2/23/2008

We said earlier today that there would be some big moves by some of those also-rans from yesterday.

The biggest jump from one of those thus far has come from Fred Roumbanis. He was sitting in 44th going into today with 5 pounds, 11 ounces.

In the last hour or so, he's started showing out. Right now he's moved to 12th place overall with a 16 1/2-pound stringer that is anchored by an estimated 6-pound lunker.

His overall total is around 22 pounds, 3 ounces, which is more than 13 pounds behind Jones at this point. Doubtful that he can close that gap today, but he might up another few pounds and still be in a position to make a move Sunday.

"Big Show" Scroggins has finally found a keeper, a 1 pound, 7 ounce savior if you will. But he's still floundering a bit.

Notable on that one-fish snide with him is:

Casey Ashley at 1-8 and in 18th place.
Kevin VanDam at 1-0 and in 14th
Todd Faircloth at 3-9 and in 14th

And Mike Baskett, one of the Federation Nation anglers, who has a single fish weighing in at 5 pounds. Come on brother keep up that pace. Baskett is in 17th overall with 20-3.

All of the guys with one fish have the opportunity to make the biggest moves if they start catching them or judging by their Day One performance could have the deepest drops.

Currently, only 14 of the 50 anglers have limits.

ANDERSON, S.C., 11:15 a.m. — 2/23/2008

Looking at the tote board, the catch rates seem to be a little subdued from yesterday, but not much.

Listening to James Overstreet, my crack photographer, whose running around the lake like a wild man, you would think no one is catching them.

Yesterday, he tripped up on a few anglers like Cliff Pace, who he said was "seigning the pond."

Today, he's got a black cloud hovering over his big head and has seen limited action. Don't know how that figures into anything, but I wanted to bust him out for having a big head and a black cloud.

As far as the real action is concerned, Alton Jones is still the man of the hour. He just added another 4-pound class fish to his creel bringing his daily stringer to 18 pounds and his total up to about 35 pounds, 5 oucnes, more than 4 pounds ahead of Hartley.

Jones is no stranger to winning. It's just been awhile since he's hoisted a trophy. But he's one of the more complete anglers out there, who is dangerous in a variety of habitats.

He's one of those guys you say "It's just a matter of time before he wins the Classic." This might be his year. Then again, we've been saying that about Gary Klein ever since George Cochran slipped by him in 1987 on the Ohio River.

Standings to this point:

Alton Jones: 35-5
Charlie Hartley: 30-14
Bobby Lane: 28-14
Scott Rook: 28-4
Aaron Martens: 26-7
Michael Iaconelli: 26-5
Cliff Pace: 23-13
Dave Wolak: 23-8
Edwin Evers: 23-6
Kotaro Kiriyama: 23-5

Scroggins is still scoreless and KVD is finally on the board with a keeper at 1 pound.

ANDERSON, S.C., 10:40 a.m. — 2/23/2008

It was just a matter of time before we started seeing some big moves. In the last 30 minutes, Alton Jones has been moving and shaking. He's capped off a limit with 3- and 4-pound-class fish, pushing his daily limit to 16 pounds, 8 ounces and overall total of 33-13.

That puts puts him squarely in the lead. By our count, he's almost 5 pounds ahead of Bobby Lane, which doesn't matter now that I've typed it, because Hartley is back in second, moving up with a limit totalling 9-13.

Now that's a move.

Jones is concentrating on the lower end of the lake and evidently he's stumbled on something. He's in the same neighborhood as Iaconelli, Casey Ashley and Jared Lintner, none of whom are having a day anything like that.

These pros continually talk about running across pods of fish that can make you well in a hurry. Don't know if that was the case with Alton, but it makes you want to guess.

The top five looks like this:

Alton Jones: 16-8 for 33-13 total
Charlie Hartley: 9-13 for 30-14
Bobby Lane: 3-13 for 28-14
Scott Rook: 6-15 for 27-12
Michael Iaconelli: 8-0 for 26-5

Stay tuned...

ANDERSON, S.C., 10:10 a.m. — 2/23/2008

It's completely clear now and the leaderboard is jockeying some but overall no major changes.

Bobby Lane sits atop the leaderboard with a 13-14 limit and two-day total of about 28-14.

Charlie Hartley is still in range with four keepers (7-5) for a two-day total of 28-6 and Scott Rook has four at 5-15 and a 26-12 total.

The only other anglers to boat a limit at this point is Greg Hackney (6-13 pounds in 7th place) and Dave Wolak (6-4 in 15th place).

At this point there are no real surprises or big jumps. But you can just feel them getting ready to happen.

I take that back. A little bit of a surprise is 35 anglers have caught keepers (that's not it) but two anglers who have yet to capture a keeper is Kevin VanDam and Terry Scroggins.

It was late in the morning when Scroggins jumped into the picture yesterday.

But KVD was on the board by now.

For those asking on the conversation below, Casey Ashley has one in the boat (1 1/2-pounds). He's sitting in 15th place. But he came on strong late yesterday, so there's no real reason to worry about him. In the meantime, you should check out his song "Fisherman."

To a couple of others, you guys are just looking for something to complain about. But that's okay.

Be back soon, stay tuned.

ANDERSON, S.C., 9:15 a.m. — 2/23/2008

Exactly half of the field has boated a keeper by 9:15 a.m., but there hasn't been a whole lot of changes in the leaderboard over the last hour.

It's actually expected those big changes will start taking place after the mid-day point. Right now it's still slightly foggy. But in the next little while, that final bit of fog will burn off and take away that overcast feel.

When that happens, a lot of the largemouth these guys are catching will start to position themselves around the available cover, mostly a few docks still in the water.

Scott Rook, for example, went into this event begging for sunshine. He had no idea he could catch them as well as he did with out it. As it's gotten brighter, he's started catching them. Right now, he has two keepers for 3-15, but he's still down the standings, in about 5th place.

The sunshine thing goes for several of these guys, and I would expect as it gets brighter the catch rates will change. A large part of these hoped-for fish are coming from schooling action or, better put, from fish chasing the blueback herring.

That's more prevalent in a sunny situation as well.

So as the day wears on, be ready for a lot of changes ... maybe.

Meanwhile the unofficial standings look like this:

1. Bobby Lane: 13-1 on Day Two for a 28-01 total
2. Charlie Hartley: 6-01 for 27-02 total
3. Alton Jones: 9-0 for 26-5 total
4. Michael Iaconelli: 6-8 for 24-13 total
5. Scott Rook: 3-15 for 24-12 total

Notable to that is KVD has yet to catch a keeper, and sits in 10th place.

ANDERSON, S.C., 8:45 a.m. — 2/23/2008

If you don't have anything better to do, check us out at 9 a.m. on the LakeCam.

Our dotcom crew at the lake will be on the show. We'll give you an inside look into the mansion and how we roll in the middle of a Classic day.

Speaking of rolling. Bobby Lane has turned up the heat a bit, he's culling (three to be exact) and has a second-day stringer of 11-15, pushing his overall weight to 26-15.

Alton Jones has moved to second with three fish weighing 9 pounds (nice average).

Our boy Charlie, he's still stuck on two fish and sits in third.

Rook and VanDam are fishless. But there's a lot of time left.

ANDERSON, S.C., 8:15 a.m. — 2/23/2008

Charlie Hartley, evidently, will not go away quietly. There was some question.

Hartley is one of the best-natured anglers on any tour anywhere. I'm not so sure he wouldn't win a most-popular award from the anglers who fish against him. Same goes for his wife, who has dubbed him "DC."

That stands for "Disappearing Charlie," for his penchant of slowly disappearing out of sight of the top of the leaderboard in a tournament.

She's just kidding. So is Charlie.

But he ain't disappearing anytime soon. While Bobby Lane has once again started the day off with a limit of fish and moved up the leaderboard, Hartley is holding his own. Right now he has two keepers totalling 4 pounds, 11 ounces. He's still in the lead with a total 25-12.

Lane has moved to second with 25-11, Rook is still third with yesterday's total 20-13 and Kotaro Kiriyama is making some noise, moving up to fourth with two keepers at 3-10 and 20-5 total.

At this hour 17 pros have boated a keeper, the rest are still searching.

ANDERSON, S.C., 7:15 a.m. — 2/23/2008

The boats are idling out from Portman Marina. The banks are lined with spectators, the ESPN helicopter is buzzing over my mansion and there's enough people standing on the check-out dock to sink the Titanic.

It's crazy how many people will show up for a Bassmaster Classic takeoff. Makes you wonder if anyone sleeps in South Carolina.

Now that this puppy is under way, you start wondering how the day will play out. I'm not exactly Carnac when it comes to looking into the future, but you have to expect that some of the guys at the top of the heap will fall like socks on a rooster.

Still others will make an adjustment and have the type day that will put them in contention to win Sunday.

The change in the weather is so drastic that some of the anglers have completely abandoned their Day One game plans in anticipation of better things.

Casey Ashley is one of those. And even Charlie Hartley, who caught a small limit early, has said he won't bother with that and go straight to the better fish that put him in the lead on Day One.

I'm sure there are others. But the basic point is, minus the crowd, the helicopter and the event we're in, this is a completely different day.

Yesterday was centered on not losing a chance to win. The consensus is those in the top 15 or 20 are the only ones who still have a shot.

While the expectation is you have to be in the top five by the end of the day. Having seen guys like Rick Clunn and Hank Parker come from much further back and win in these events, I'm not sure if I agree with that assumption.

Only time will tell.

One thing that has stayed the same: Bobby Lane is obviously keyed in to an early bite. Within the first 10 minutes and while I typed the above, he's boated two keepers, weighing about 4 1/2 pounds total.

Not the kind of fish to keep him in the top of the standings, but for the moment he's taken the lead.

ANDERSON, S.C., 6:45 a.m. — 2/23/2008

It's amazing a difference 24 hours can make. The nasty, cold rain that permeated yesterday's take off has been replaced with a really decent morning.

Temperatures are in the 40's and compared to yesterday, this feels like the tropics. Evidently, the folks in South Carolina agree. They turned out big yesterday, this morning it's a downright party.

The only potential crashers of that party is a possible fog. Right now it's clear enough. But it could get thick quick.

Once this thing kicks off, we'll start giving updates.

Yesterday, I think we did fairly well on the final results. Sure, we had Charlie Hartley in third place. We did have Scott Rook in second. Their weights were both less than pound off.

About the only ones we really missed were Casey Ashley who jumped into the top 10, I assume late in the day. And Michael Iaconelli. I should have almost expected that. Every fish that crazy sucker catches is a giant. So I already knew he suffered from Big Eye Syndrome (you'll have to check yesterday's blog to get that explanation).

There were a few other little differences, but mostly the BassTrakk system was dead on. I expect it to be more of the same today.

Stay tuned.

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